Robert j stevens biography of martin luther

Erlangen, , vol. Luther, angered, responded harshly — by his own admission — too harshly. Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly. Nonetheless, history has shown that this personality of Luther was exactly what was needed at the time to re light the fire of Reformation in Europe. Luther had been installed as a professor in Wittenberg in , and was shortly thereafter promoted to the chair of professor of theology, where he would spend the next few years teaching on the Psalms, Romans, Galatians and Hebrews.

It was during his 69 Luther, Correnspondence, , While one would be inclined to assume this type of act to be one of open rebellion, it is likely that Luther, unable to fathom the consequences, did not, despite his dramatic course of action, intend it as such. The profound influence of the initiator of the Reformation had after is seen in a letter written to him in , shortly after he was taken by prince Frederick, by the influential German humanist, Nikolaus Gerbel.

Men of stature, like prince Frederick, went out of their way, even at the risk of their own lives, to protect him, a testimony to the attractiveness of his passionate personality. After completing a German translation of the New Testament, Luther would come out of hiding and return to Wittenberg in March , where he would live out the rest of his days.

In the years preceding Luther had continued his work in preaching and teaching in Wittenberg, and in married the runaway nun Catharina von Bora. From Luther would dedicate himself to caring for his family, teaching at Wittenberg and producing some of his best and also most controversial theological works — a testimony that his passion never wavered.

This latter half of his career, nonetheless, testifies of the love he had for his family in particular, but also the faithful at 77 Mullet, Luther, , Schoeck and B. University of Toronto Press, Toronto, , Brill: Leiden, , Abington Press: Nashville, Broadberry, S. Et al. British economic growth : DeRusha, M. On August 5, , Stevens was elected chief executive officer of Lockheed Martin by its board of directors, succeeding Vance D.

He was elected chairman on April 28, , retaining his previous responsibilities as president and CEO. Stevens was elected to remain as executive chairman through From to , Stevens served as the lead director of the Monsanto Company and from to as a member of the board of directors of the United States Steel Corporation. As of , he serves on the board of directors for T.

Rowe Price. Navy Memorial Foundation. Contents move to sidebar hide. Article Talk. Read Edit View history. Tools Tools. Download as PDF Printable version. In other projects. These years are marred by his vitriolic attacks on both Turks and thus Islam and Jews, in a marked change of tone from his earlier more considered and appreciative reflections, which had included That Jesus Christ was Born a Jew —although his positive remarks are based on hopes of Jewish conversion, while many of his comments in his unpublished lectures on Psalms had been hostile; partly because those hopes did not materialise, by Luther was writing Against the Sabbatarians , a polemic which he was to continue to the end of his life in further anti-Jewish texts.

The end of that life was to come on 18 February , in the town of Eisleben where he had been born. At the burial ceremony in Wittenberg, Melanchthon spoke the eulogy. Whilst there is no doubt that Luther saw himself primarily as a theologian, as we have seen his education also involved significant philosophical aspects, whilst he engaged with philosophical issues and debates throughout his career.

Nonetheless, he was concerned to demarcate clearly between the two disciplines, which for him also involved becoming clear about the limitations of reason in relation to matters of faith. Rather, it would be more accurate to say that he was keen to keep reason within its proper boundaries and under the right tutelage. White 60—81 for criticisms of Ebeling.

The position of philosophy is not rejected entirely, but shown to be severely truncated in the light of theology. According to philosophy, a human being is an embodied animal equipped with a reason that relies on sensations or experience; it thus conceives of us in merely mortal terms and in relation to the world around us. Luther agrees that in this context philosophy is right to view reason as.

This means that theology can not only treat God as fundamental in its account of efficient and of final causes as creator, and as the source of eternal happiness and salvation respectively , but it also sees human beings in the light of the Fall and also of grace and salvation, in a way that reason without theology cannot fathom—and if it tries to do so, will distort in a fundamental way.

However, a more rationalistic philosopher might question whether Luther underestimates the a priori capacities of reason, thus giving reason more of a role within the theological realm when it comes to our knowledge of God. In response, Luther makes several related claims. First, while he does not reject such a priori knowledge altogether which he takes to be innate , he stresses it is severely limited, partly because it can only bring us a rather general knowledge of God, [ 11 ] and partly because it can never lead to the kind of certainty regarding God which can be found through faith and taking seriously his promise to us, particularly when it comes to matters of salvation.

Third, in attributing these capacities to ourselves, there is the danger of a kind of theological pride which will disastrously distort our proper relation to God. For Luther, these limitations of reason can be felt within theology in the kind of puzzlement and perplexity which reason feels when confronted by the scriptures and faith, where such puzzlement combined with an undue estimation of reason can lead to the overthrow of the latter by the former.

The Sorbonne, the mother of errors, very badly laid down that the same thing is true in philosophy and in theology. WA However, it is more commonly held that in making this claim, Luther has something more moderate in mind, which is suggested by Thesis 1 of this Disputation:.

Robert j stevens biography of martin luther

This can be interpreted as holding that realms of truth are diverse, in the sense that some truth can only be stated in certain fields but not others, but nonetheless all truths are consonant with one another see Gerrish 53—4; White Chapter 3; Dieter ; Luy 15—16; and see Bianchi for a history of this issue. White —48, Bielfeldt b. Likewise, because the philosopher operates with formal systems of syllogistic logic, which do not sufficiently take into account the special nature of the objects of faith, such logics will also break down when dealing with theological matters.

Ambrose has rightly said that the dialecticians have to give way where the apostolic fishermen are to be trusted. Luther was clearly attracted to the need for inner experience, and spoke of achieving a kind of union with or participation in God, while attaching great merit to some writings in the mystical tradition, particularly the sermons of John Tauler and the Theologia deutsch, a late fourteenth-century work which was transmitted to him by some Augustinian brothers.

He edited it twice, in and , wrongly attributing it to Johann Tauler c. It seems like Luther transformed mysticism into a form of sacramental mysticism which was compatible with the Church Leppin He still stuck to his mystical roots in a disputation like De homine where he used the same metaphor of the human being as the matter to be formed by God as he had already used in his annotations to John Tauler.

In commenting on De anima , Luther objects that it contradicts Christian teaching on the immortality of the soul. In both areas, Aristotle is hampered by his hylomorphism, his view that matter and form are interrelated, so that in this respect Luther favours Plato over Aristotle. Away with such books! Keep them away from Christians. For here, Luther argued, one can find the idea that virtue is something to be developed through our own efforts and instilled in us through habituation, thus making the idea of good works central to the idea of moral improvement.

This, however, is to generate a sense of pride in our own abilities which precisely negates the possibility of good action, for reasons we will consider further in the next section. And while Luther does not mention him explicitly in the Disputation , not surprisingly he elsewhere occasionally but strongly criticizes Aquinas for also falling under the baleful influence of Aristotle on this issue.

On the Finnish interpretation, justification involves actual participation in the divine life, and thus has ontological implications for the justified individual. The central text here is of course The Bondage of the Will , in which, as we have seen, Luther engages with Erasmus on precisely this issue. Against Erasmus, Luther argues that scepticism is not an appropriate outlook for Christians who are called on to assert their faith as trust in God, while also criticising him for putting any weight on the decrees of the Church, rather than on scripture alone, which Luther insists is clear enough in its essentials and what it tells us, even though the mind of God himself may be harder to fathom, and it may be difficult for us to make philosophical sense of doctrines such as the Trinity.

Moreover, Luther criticises Erasmus for his suggestion that it is not in fact necessary for the Christian to try to settle matters relating to free will, particularly given the dangers that attach to speculating on such questions. In response, Luther argues that this issue cannot be avoided and is central, for. Likewise, Luther argues, the question of divine foreknowledge and of whether everything happens necessarily is also an issue which cannot be avoided:.

For if you doubt or disdain to know that God foreknows all things, not contingently, but necessarily and immutably, how can you believe his promises and place a sure trust and reliance on them? For Luther, however, this is simply to beg the question, as living a better life and believing in God are not things we can bring about in ourselves, but only occur through God.

Erasmus [ 41] , where he makes several key claims that will be developed further in what follows. First, he argues that this is entailed once we accept that our salvation is the work of God, from which it follows that if we do good it is a result of his agency, while if that agency is not present all we can do is what is bad, so that we lack any power of choice in this matter.

However, secondly Luther stresses that this does not mean we are compelled or forced to act as we do, so that. Thus, though we lack free choice, we do not lack free will, understood as a force that leads us to act, a force that grows stronger the more it is resisted. At this point, Luther makes his famous use of the traditional simile, that the human will is like a horse that can fall under two riders, Satan or God, who will determine which way it goes, but like a horse it follows either perfectly willingly:.

If Satan rides it, it wills and goes where Satan will; nor can it choose to run to either of the two riders or to seek him out, but the riders themselves contend for the possession and control of it. That is to say, a man should know that with regard to his faculties and possessions he has the right to use, to do, or to leave undone, according to his own free choice, though even this is controlled by the free choice of God alone, who acts in whatever way he pleases.

On the other hand in relation to God, or in matters pertaining to salvation or damnation, a man has no free choice, but is a captive, subject and slave either of the will of God or the will of Satan. Given this confused picture, Luther concludes that as a result, the matter must be settled by appeal to scripture alone, and not by appeal to the authority of previous commentators, or of the Church.

At the beginning of Part Three of his own work, before getting on to these passages, Luther begins with an important critique of the definition of free choice with which Erasmus had started his discussion:. By free choice in this place we mean a power of the human will by which a man can apply himself to the things which lead to eternal salvation, or turn away from them.

First, he points out that as free choice applies to God and angels, Erasmus is wrong to define it as applying only to human will. Nadia May is a good reader, though I regret her mispronouncing many words. Overall still worthy of the highest score. Elizabeth Suli. This is a detailed description more about the reformation, and follows the progress of how this happened.

Really enjoyed getting a better understanding of the reformation and how God used Luther and so many others to do the impossible. Wesley Hankins. Great reading! This translation was considerably easier to read than his histories of the Reformation, All well worth reading. Very sparse in everything other than the few years before and after October Fascinating detail in that decade though.

What the book covers it covers in great detail. The score is lowered because of what the book fails to cover. As explained in the introduction to the book it is complied from selections of D'Aubigne's History of the Reformation of the Sixteenth Century or Histoire de la Reformation au XVIie sicle Paris, —; new ed:, —, in 5 vols.